Childhood Stories: Sky is the Limit
by Dooms Whiskers
Summary: Characters: Splinter and young turtles   Mikey gets to know how beautiful the world outside is and feels sadness not being able to see it...  Trying to keep everyone in character, do read and review, please!  P.S. Hope, I got the rating system correct...


A/N: It's my first normal attempt at writing a good fanfic. Hope it's not as bad as it seems. At least hope so. Read and review, please!

**Sky is the Limit**

'Uh, Donny?' the little turtle popped outta nowhere, which made his elder brother shudder.

'Dontcha EVER creep on me like that, Mikey,' Donatello mumbled while quickly hiding the schemes he was trying to figure out before a catastrophy called Mikey sets its hands on those precious things.

'Well, I'm sorry,' Mikey looked embaressed. 'I just wanted to know if you could read this,' he showed his bro a book opened on a page with a grassland scenary on one side of it and a comment on the other one. Seeing Donnie's hesistation, Mikey decided to use his secret weapon.

'Don't do that!' Donny exclaimed as soon as he saw Mikey staring at him with puppy-dog eyes. 'I'm not looking,' Donny closed his eyes and turned around to show he wasn't bluffing.

Several seconds went by before Donny turned around. 'All right, all right!' he sighed as Mikey's face brightened and took the book. 'Where'd you find it anyway?' Donatello took his time to look through other pages. All of them were full of various landscape pictures.

'Uh... I found it in the bookcase,' Mikey was concealing something and Donny found no better way to react than to look straight into his brother's eyes. Mikey was weak enough to bear this torture only for several seconds.

'Alright, alright! So it wasn't the bookcase,' the kid confessed. 'I found it outside,' then he added in a hurry. 'It was right near our place and Raph was there.'

'Yeah. So now Raph's in trouble too,' Donny sighed. 'Yay...'

'You won't tell Leo, will ya?' Mikey's smile wanished from his face.

Donny waited silently for a moment and then broke the dramatic pause, 'Nah! I don't like Leo ranting 'bout res-pon-sai-bi-li-teh either,' he clearly made fun of his elder bro's speaking manner.

'So now you're talking real stuff,' Raph showed up behind their backs. 'He _really_ doesn't have to know,' he clinched Mikey's head while giving his bro a noogie.

'Raph! Knock it off!' Mikey was trying to free himself but what could the smallest kid in the family do against the toughest one?

'Yeah? So whatcha gonna do?' Raph chuckled. 'Tell Master Splinter I've beaten you up?'

'Raph! Let go of him!' Leo decided to show up.

'Or what?' Raph smiled, holding his younger brother even tighter. Mikey started choking.

'Do you always have to do that?' Leo looked seriously displeased and even angry. 'Don't you know what responsibility is? Can't you take anything seriously?'

'I'm really serious and I'm gonna show it by giving this one here a serious shell-ache!' Raph smirked and a heavy punch made Mikey loose some precious air with a loud 'ouch!'.

'Well, you're just an ignorant insolent little jerk! Can't you mind others' needs for once! Like Mikey's, for example,' Leo was ready to freak out. 'This is going nowhere!'

'Yeah, Raph. Let it go,' Donny risked taking part in the conflict.

'Firstly, buzz off, Donny!' Raph growled, 'Secondly, who's little?' he mocked his bro while torturing the youngest one with no remorse. 'And thirdly, guess, someone here needs to get a grip.'

'Pick on someone of your own size!' Leo snapped as he was out of arguments and Mikey was in desperate need of air.

'Like you?' Raph grinned. 'Well, why not? Be ready 'cause I'm gonna kick your shell!'

Leo found no better thing to do than take a stance and get ready for battle. At least Raph had let go of Mikey, who was now busy catching his breath.

Two bros circled ready to start a fray while the other two were silently observing. To Donny it seemed that today trouble was yearning to become his best friend.

When Splinter peeped into the room the scene consisted of two entangled bodies on the floor, Mikey jumping around and rooting for Leo and Donny trying not to pay attention to all this mess. A single cough was enough to inform the gang that all of them were grounded.

* * *

'That's all your fault!' Leo exclaimed pointing at Raph.

'Yeah! Blame me for getting into someone else's business! What I do with my baby bro is none of your concern!'

'Well, no one gave you the right to bully him!'

'Grr! That's none of your!..'

'Guys!' Mikey's voice immediately made the duo pay attention to the other half of the family. 'We're trying to read here!'

Donatello let several seconds slip by while his brothers formed a circle around him and started reading aloud, 'Sally fell on the warm grass carpet feeling the breeze play with her hair. She glanced onto the bright sky up above and before she knew it she was engrossed into staring into the endless sea of light blue colour. It seemed to her that she was seeing heaven so far yet so close. All the problems of life meant nothing as long as she could stay and stare.'

The turtles kept silent and no one asked to turn over the page. Mikey leaned forward to touch the picture on the page. That gesture pretty much summed up the general mood.

'It's dinner time,' Splinter's voice broke the uncomfortable silence and the boys slipped out of the room one by one. Leo cast a worried glance at Mikey, who seemed to be down as it can be, but said nothing.

* * *

Master Splinter was already waiting for them. He even managed to bring some pizza to vary their everyday menu. The promised detention was already forgotten. How could such a loving father be mad at his sons for more than a single moment? And that very father was most concerned when he saw four sour faces. If even Mikey lost his appetite and wasn't joking around something must've gone terribly wrong.

Before Splinter could ask, Mikey looked him in the eyes, 'Master Splinter, why can't we go outside to see the sky?' his pleading tone only added to the confusion.

Splinter hadn't even come up with an idea for an answer when three other voices asked the same question. Four pairs of sad face surely belonged to the list of things the old rat wanted to see the least.

'My sons,' Splinter started after some hesistation, 'I've already told you that the world outside is no playground. It is dangerous above as humans won't understand our nature and it's human to destroy what they don't understand,' he sighed. 'I know that there are things you want to see but I can't risk loosing you.'

The brothers sat in silence hiding their eyes.

'Can't we just peep outside for a moment and then hide again?' Mikey ventured to ask. 'Please?'

'I'm sorry, Mikelangelo...'

'That's not fair!' the kid shouted out of a sudden and rushed out of the room before anyone could say a word.

That made the kitchen fall into awkward silence.

'Shouldn't we... do something?' Donny was the first to break through the awkwardness that surrounded the whole situation.

'Guess, we _are_ to do something,' Leo added still looking at the doorway where Mikey disappeared.

'Yeah? Like what? Make a sky right here in the sewers for that show-off?' Raph was grumpy as always.

'Raphael! Don't!..' Splinter was about to scold his son when...

'Bingo!' Donny's smile was so promising that everyone just had to pay attention. 'That's it! We'll make our own sky down here!'

'You're out of your mind too, huh?' Raph was skeptical.

''Course not! I've got a plan! Listen!..'

* * *

'Mikey!' came from the other side of the door. 'I know you're there!'

Mikelangelo, although having the strength to answer, didn't want to respond. He had his eyes red and 'strong men don't cry'. And Raph must be around to bully him if he opens the door. That's for sure. So the best thing to do is just to sit it through, all alone and pay no attention to Leo's voice.

His brother had another point of view, so very soon his calling voice started to get on Mikey's nerves and the turtle was almost ready to shout out with irritation.

'What?' he opened the door still trying to conceal his eyes but there was no one in sight.

'Now thaaaat's a little weird,' Mikey didn't know what to think. Maybe, they've already forgotten about the whole quarrel and won't pay attention to him once he's out of the room. 'Or I'll get punished for being such a selfish kid,' Mikey sighed but left the safety of his den.

It was strangely quiet in the hall. Where are his brothers? And where did Master Splinter go? Did they leave for the surface while he's not around? Mikey sat right on the floor ready to cry. All this wasn't fair at all. Didn't he deserve at least a little bit of sunlight? Why couldn't those stupid people find another place to live? Why...

Mikey gasped as the lights went out. He wasn't actually scared of darkness but it all was too sudden.

'Raaaph! That's not funny!' Mikey stretched the words. 'I'm not scared, anyway!'

Then Mikey had to gasp again as the ceiling got lit up with little white dots that went blinking and moving bit by bit. It was unbelievably beautiful. The kid couldn't look anywhere but in that eternal spotted blackness which was in front of him in all its peaceful beauty. Splinter and the other three turtles quietly left their hideout behind the counch to join Mikey. Before he knew it, he was lying on his back with his family around him.

'Well, my projector idea worked,' Donny thought as he looked at his brother's dreamy face with a brotherly smile.

That night Mikey fell asleep with a happy smile on his face.


End file.
